Every so often something happens that reminds me just how little and also how much I know.
The night before last we had dinner with a couple of Swiss people we met on the island. One of them was in Providencia for a couple of days only, as she had come to Colombia to look at some projects that the organization she works for funds indirectly. This meant that she had been to lots of places in Colombia I have only dreamed of going, a lot of war-torn places, that are beautiful and unique but with an incredible amount of suffering.
She talked about these places and the situations people where in, and confessed she had been so surprised and impressed. Karina (that was her name) has traveled through most of Latin America, and always thought that Colombia being a much wealthier place than most of its neighboring countries, probably did not need as much foreign support as say Bolivia or Peru. But upon leaving the major cities she discovered the extent to which war has affected the country, leaving displaced people everywhere, with an incredible lack of education. I know about this, but when she was talking about it in detail I felt so ignorant, to me it is abstract, to her having come from 4 weeks of traveling around Colombia it was specific
She was so impressed though with the programs that have been set up by community leaders, a lot of them priests, who are doing a lot with very little to help their community. She was surprised that a lot of these priests were not even concerned to push religion on people but just wanted to help. This made me happy to hear.
I told her about my mixed feelings about Colombia, about how I feel I don't really know my country any more and that I don't have the necessary tools to try and effect any sort of change. She said, trust me you know so much about your country, so much more than other people and you should trust yourself and your instincts.
She then told me about what had surprised her the most, the spirit of Colombian people. This I know. She said she was surprised that amidst war and lack of resources people seemed to be in generally high spirits, that this was not the case in a lot of the countries she visited where a sense of hopelessness and resignation exists. Karina was amazed at the resilience and strength of people. This I know. She finally confessed that it seemed to her after being all around Latin America and only coming to Colombia for the first time on this trip, that Colombian people were the nicest and most warm people she had met in Latin America. This I did not know. It felt nice to hear it though.
The conversation with Karina made me realize how much of who I am and the way I approach life is distinctly Colombian. Despite the fact that I have spent now a considerable amount of time in the US and that a lot of my ideas and approach to life has been influenced and affected by the US point of view, my core is distinctly Colombian. And again I felt so proud of being Colombian at that moment; of being part of a group of people that are warm and welcoming, loving and more than anything extremely hopeful. And then I gave thanks.
Showing posts with label hope. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hope. Show all posts
Friday, November 27, 2009
Thursday, October 1, 2009
WHY HOPE?
I have known I want to be an artist for a while.
Senior year of high school in health class, as we were discussing risk takers, our teacher asked that we raise our hands if we were planning on pursuing professions with any measure of risk. A couple of people raised their hands and said things like firemen and policemen; I raised my hand and said I wanted to be an artist. To this most of the class responded with laughter. In their minds it was ridiculous that I thought being an artist was dangerous at all. But as I enter “the real world” after graduating from Williams College with my art degree in hand, I realize just how much of a risk it is to decide to be an artist.
I grew up in a family of doctors. So much so that it seemed much easier and feasible to become a doctor than it would to become an artist. I had no idea what it would actually mean to be an artist. Going to college helped a lot with that, mostly because I met lots of artists for the first time in my life. People who were practicing and excited about the making of art and what it meant to put art out into the world. For the first time in my life I had some sense of what it was like to be an artist and some relatively concrete notions of how to go about being one. And it was wonderful. During my time at college I realized that despite the risks involved in being an artist, communicating through the visual medium was what I was most passionate about.
The guiding principle in my life is hope. Art has a unique place in our society, in that it allows us to do something amazing; to put out into a world that sometimes seems so dark, new possible realities. It allows us in a world that is so often separate to create connections and whether or not we understand one another, to feel something together. The most opposite things are ultimately two limits of the same thing. I like to imagine the possibility of them collapsing into one experience, of creating connections between things, people and materials where there seemingly is none.
I like the idea that we affect each other. That we are connected and related and that whether we know it or not within us, within our mind, within our body, within our soul we carry the traces of the past and simultaneously the possibilities for the future. I have been exploring memory and history- a sort of communal memory- in my work, and the possibility that these things that are all within me, within us, become physically present. What if our dreams, fears, memories, ideas all seeped out of our bodies and started to take over the world; to little by little cover things and stretch out. What if our stories, cries, laughters stayed in the atmosphere and made everyday life that much richer. What if as we walked by, other people's own bursting dreams and experiences little by little mixed with ours and seeped back into our body. The guiding principle of my art is hope.
For the next year I will be discovering what it means to be an artist. Actually an artist, full time, 24-7. And simultaneously I will be exploring my relationship with my home country and my status as a citizen of one country, a resident of another and a human being who is part of a world that every day is more interconnected and united. I will spend about 6 months in Colombia splitting my time between Bogota and Providencia, a small tropical island in the Caribbean before I return to the US.
This blog is meant to share my experience as I delve into hope and other dangerous pursuits.
Senior year of high school in health class, as we were discussing risk takers, our teacher asked that we raise our hands if we were planning on pursuing professions with any measure of risk. A couple of people raised their hands and said things like firemen and policemen; I raised my hand and said I wanted to be an artist. To this most of the class responded with laughter. In their minds it was ridiculous that I thought being an artist was dangerous at all. But as I enter “the real world” after graduating from Williams College with my art degree in hand, I realize just how much of a risk it is to decide to be an artist.
I grew up in a family of doctors. So much so that it seemed much easier and feasible to become a doctor than it would to become an artist. I had no idea what it would actually mean to be an artist. Going to college helped a lot with that, mostly because I met lots of artists for the first time in my life. People who were practicing and excited about the making of art and what it meant to put art out into the world. For the first time in my life I had some sense of what it was like to be an artist and some relatively concrete notions of how to go about being one. And it was wonderful. During my time at college I realized that despite the risks involved in being an artist, communicating through the visual medium was what I was most passionate about.
The guiding principle in my life is hope. Art has a unique place in our society, in that it allows us to do something amazing; to put out into a world that sometimes seems so dark, new possible realities. It allows us in a world that is so often separate to create connections and whether or not we understand one another, to feel something together. The most opposite things are ultimately two limits of the same thing. I like to imagine the possibility of them collapsing into one experience, of creating connections between things, people and materials where there seemingly is none.
I like the idea that we affect each other. That we are connected and related and that whether we know it or not within us, within our mind, within our body, within our soul we carry the traces of the past and simultaneously the possibilities for the future. I have been exploring memory and history- a sort of communal memory- in my work, and the possibility that these things that are all within me, within us, become physically present. What if our dreams, fears, memories, ideas all seeped out of our bodies and started to take over the world; to little by little cover things and stretch out. What if our stories, cries, laughters stayed in the atmosphere and made everyday life that much richer. What if as we walked by, other people's own bursting dreams and experiences little by little mixed with ours and seeped back into our body. The guiding principle of my art is hope.
For the next year I will be discovering what it means to be an artist. Actually an artist, full time, 24-7. And simultaneously I will be exploring my relationship with my home country and my status as a citizen of one country, a resident of another and a human being who is part of a world that every day is more interconnected and united. I will spend about 6 months in Colombia splitting my time between Bogota and Providencia, a small tropical island in the Caribbean before I return to the US.
This blog is meant to share my experience as I delve into hope and other dangerous pursuits.
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